PROMISE: Our kitties will never sit on top of content. Please turn off your ad blocker for our site.
puuuuuuurrrrrrrrrrrr
Jason Furness
Published: Wednesday, February 28, 2018 - 12:02 In a previous article I wrote about the reasons why so many lean manufacturing, Six Sigma, and other improvement programs fail. In this article I’m going to expand on reason No. 1: the Academy Award Syndrome. The Academy Award Syndrome is where a program or project is launched to much fanfare, ceremony, and expense, but six months later all that remains is a bunch of faded posters on the wall, boxes of expensive and unused workbooks, and an even more cynical and jaded bunch of employees than we had before. In our society we are generally becoming more cynical. We are certainly overwhelmed with the launches of new initiatives from our politicians, from companies that are trying to sell us new products, and the daily media cycle that supports these launches. Within a company our new project or initiative that we are all enthusiastic about is probably not the first that has ever occurred. If previous initiatives have been launched and then abandoned, our employees can be very cynical, and this can cripple our program. When we launch a big initiative in the textbook way, as prescribed in many books written about the Toyota Production System, we have top management announce it to show their commitment. We have training, we have posters, T-shirts, lunches, and videos. I’m not kidding here; I have seen it happen, sadly more than once. 1. A lot of time and money is spent designing the right T-shirt, video, and poster, so that all the brand themes are consistent and cultural subtleties about appropriate colors are observed. The list of ways to paralyze the program before it begins is long. The knock-on effects are to delay the start of the program, spend money before we have made it, and frustrate the people who ultimately have to do the work to make it all happen. Meanwhile your focused, effective competitor is six months further down the track, and you have not even organized the kick off BBQ! 2. Your employees having seen improvement programs come and go like the four seasons, can adopt the following behaviors: All of these things spell death! The effect we want to generate is a change in behaviors that quickly produce improved results. That’s it! Then we want to repeat that effect every hour, every, day, forever. We start by just introducing one or two changes in how we work, staying focused on those changes until we see the effects we want to see appear. Then we introduce a few more, and a few more. The point here is that we go about this in a low-key, results-focused, and supportive fashion. The ultimate compliment you can be paid is when one of your people says something like, “Production, quality, safety, and housekeeping just seem different, better, cleaner, quieter. Not sure what is happening differently.” Actors collect their Academy Awards after the movie is released successfully. We should do the same. Comments are welcome and encouraged. In my next article I will deal with the No. 2 reason why lean manufacturing and Six Sigma projects fail to deliver a spectacular return on investment: the Magic Wand Disease. Quality Digest does not charge readers for its content. We believe that industry news is important for you to do your job, and Quality Digest supports businesses of all types. However, someone has to pay for this content. And that’s where advertising comes in. Most people consider ads a nuisance, but they do serve a useful function besides allowing media companies to stay afloat. They keep you aware of new products and services relevant to your industry. All ads in Quality Digest apply directly to products and services that most of our readers need. You won’t see automobile or health supplement ads. So please consider turning off your ad blocker for our site. Thanks, Jason Furness, CEO and founder of Manufacturship, is an executive coach who provides lean manufacturing training and lean consulting in a pragmatic, hands-on way that gets clients results in a fast and sustainable manner. Furness oversees the development and delivery of Manufacturship’s curriculum, leads the mentoring of business owners and managers, and sponsors all client projects. During his 20-year career he has led 30 transformation projects for small and medium-sized enterprises. Furness is the co-author of Manufacturing Money: How CEOs Rapidly Lift Profits in Manufacturing (Amazon Digital Services, 2015).The No. 1 Reason Why Continuous Improvement Projects Fail
There is an effect we want to repeat every hour, every day, forever
Academy Award Syndrome
Two distinct effects are produced
• Sit back and wait to see if this thing will die the same way as all the others.
• Actively resist just to be proven right.
• Have a negative perception about the project before it has started.What do we do differently?
Our PROMISE: Quality Digest only displays static ads that never overlay or cover up content. They never get in your way. They are there for you to read, or not.
Quality Digest Discuss
About The Author
Jason Furness
© 2023 Quality Digest. Copyright on content held by Quality Digest or by individual authors. Contact Quality Digest for reprint information.
“Quality Digest" is a trademark owned by Quality Circle Institute, Inc.
Comments
Broken link
Great article. It is a pity that the link to the previous article is not valid.
Link removed